by Teresa
(Iowa)
They are contesting my unemployment….i have proof I was not a no show no call and would never have just quit and negligently not contacted employer…..I loved my job and was in the office picking up my new schedule when my directory pulled me into her office and h.r. was on speaker phone to tell me I had quit after my self quarantine ended.
Hi Teresa,
So let me get a little more info about the situation.
Have you already been initially denied by Iowa, or are you still waiting on the typical phone fact finder conducted by Iowa, where both the employer and claimant are invited to appear by phone simultaneously, before an initial determination is issued?
Also, if you self quarantined, when did you do that, for how long did you quarantine yourself? Did you call in each day you were gone? Was the state of Iowa under any stay at home orders at the time, issued by the state government?
If not, did you responsibly self-quarantine when symptomatic after knowing you’d been exposed to someone diagnosed as covid-19 positive?
Did you self-quarantine contrary to what your employer may of told you about coming in, when you first called in and explained the situation?
Had you been recently warned about any sort of attendance issue, or possibly of been on a final warning about your attendance at work.
I’ve been concerned about the whole concept of at-will employees deciding to self quarantine, as turning into an eligibility problem/reason I know some employers will use correctly .. and incorrectly to fight unemployment benefits, regardless of any truth that alters the circumstances.
My advice for any employee in this situation, is the same as my basic advice has always been, document document, document, any events and/or actions of both you and your employer that could be relevant to UI eligibility, even if when all is done and over, is to find out you just covered your butt for those just in case scenarios .. which I can see coming from a mile away and way down the road.